Finished! Finally! My gosh, I didn't like it at all, so full of vicious characters and deeds. Everyone but the narrator is either very bad or very stupid, and children came out of nowhere all of a sudden.
I admit it is indeed well written and sort of captivating, because of that, but I didn't like the story of cruelty, vengeance, hate and depravation, or the idiocy of some characters like Isabella: how could I pity her? He was cruel, yes, but she had been an idiot. No comparison with those women who think they've married a good man who turns out a monster: this is different, he showed her the monster that he was, everybody told her the fiend that he was, but she was all 'if I want him I can have him'.
The only decent character is Ellen Dean, also called Nelly, the narrator of the story. I felt for poor Hareton, the only one who encountered my sympathy: he was vulgar and rough only because ignorance had been forced on him and he knew no different, poor lad.
Heathcliff started out as a victim, but was so cruel afterwards that I have no pity for him. Edgar Linton embraced his fate willingly, he should have known better. Catherine Earnshaw only thought of herself. Hindley Earnshaw was cruel and stupid altogether. Catherine Linton was a spoiled brat and Linton Heathcliff a pathetic, self-absorbed peevish thing of a boy. Isabella was the stupidest of all, listening to nobody and regretting her actions/marriage the very next day.
There's plenty of love-stories, and yet not one that grips my heart, because when you think about it, they had no social life at all, so nobody really fell in love, nobody chose, nobody was picked among the many; Catherine knew two boys and loved them both; little Cathy knew two also, and loved the educated one, and when he was no more decided to educate the other to love him; Isabella knew but one and got him. I mean, it's not like in other stories when people meet other people in "society".
Surely, there's a lot that we don't see, because this is Nelly's tale, and she tells it her way, so there may be many things she doesn't say, but I'm sure there weren't all that many other boys and girls available, considering that a gentleman's daughter/son would not even look at someone who was not their equal.
There's one nice image, at the end of the book, but just one is not enough to save the book.
The story:
There's a new tenant at Thrushcross Grange, and after meeting unpleasant Heathcliff he's really curious to learn about him so he asks housekeeper Ellen to tell him the whole story.
At first, at Wuthering Heights the Earnshaw family lived alone: father, mother and children fourteen-year-old Hindley and six-year-old Catherine, plus our Ellen and her mother, and Ellen was always very close to the family and as children they played together.
One day the father came home with a child, found alone in the streets, belonging to nobody (apparently) and he just took him home, like a pet. Because of him the man broke or lost the gifts he had brought for his children, so they hated Heathcliff right away...
Hindley was always jealous of him; Catherine only at first, then the two became very close. The mother didn't want the "gipsy brat" in the house and wanted to "fling it out of doors" :-/ After two years she died, though. Hindley was sent away to school, and Catherine was always so wayward that her dad said to her face "I cannot love thee, thou 'rt worse than thy brother" who mistreated Heathcliff. When the man died, after three years, Hindley came back for the funeral with his wife Frances, and became the tyrant of the family. Heathcliff's education stopped, he was to work out of doors instead, like a servant. One night Heathcliff and Catherine (when she was 12) were out, looking at the Linton children: Isabella was 11 and screaming, and her older brother Edgar was weeping. They laughed at them and tried to run away when heard, but a dog got her ankle. He was sent away as a little vagabond, while she was recognized and cared for, and stayed there for five weeks, and came home almost like a Lady, "her manners much improved".
Heathcliff was dirty and wild, and felt bad. -Next summer was 1778, nearly 23 years ago -
Hindley's wife died after giving birth to little Hareton, the true heir of Wuthering Heights. Hindley was so desperate he became more tyrannical than ever, sent all servants away but Nelly and hideous Joseph, and between his bad ways and his bad companions he started his new life of "degrading himself past redemption". At 15 Catherine was used to acting one way with Heathcliff and one way with the Lintons. When Heathcliff told her to send away Edgar and stay with him she said "what do you talk about? It's no company at all when people know nothing and say nothing".
Catherine wanted to stay alone with Edgar so she became angry at Nelly and hurt her and made a big scene, she did even strike him, and he was shocked and almost left but instead came back and proposed, the silly man.
When Hindley came home drunk and was violent with Nelly and little Hareton, and he caused the child to fall but Heathcliff happened to be there and save him : "his countenance (..) expressed the intensest anguish at having made himself the instrument of thwarting his own revenge".
When Cathy confessed to Nelly that she accepted Edgar's proposal she added: "in my soul and in my heart I'm convinced I'm wrong. I've no more business to marry Edgar Linton than I have to be in Heaven, and if the wicked man in there had not brought Heathcliff so low, I shouldn't have thought of it. It would degrade me to marry Heathcliff now so he shall never know how I love him: and that not because he's handsome but because he's more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same". She thought that marrying Edgar she could also help Heathcliff, but without her knowing he had heard her words and went away. Cathy got ill calling him all night under the rain. Mrs Linton took her to Thrushcross Grange and soon both her and Mr Linton took the fever and died (no good deed goes unpunished..). After three years Cathy married Edgar and Nelly was forced to leave nearly-five-year-old Hareton and go live with her at Thrushcross grange. In only ten months the child changed greatly: he forgot Nelly and became wild and cursing.
Cathy lived happily for six months ( +o-) with Edgar and Isabella indulging and spoiling her; then Heathcliff came back, a wealthy man. After he was "absent and silent for three years", Catherine now was all "I'm afraid the joy is too great to be real". He went to stay at Wuthering Heights with Hindley! A mystery for everybody. He wanted to live near Cathy, and his frequent visits caused eighteen-year-old Isabella to lose her head: "I love him more than ever you loved Edgar and he might love me if you would let him". Cathy tried to warn her: "he's not a rough diamond, he's a fierce, pitiless, wolfish man".
When Cathy said everything to Heathcliff, he looked at Isabelle with aversion, but she still didn't get it. When Nelly told Cathy, she had a big fight with Heathcliff, and when Nelly told Edgar, there was an even bigger fight. Cathy cared about Isabelle and therefore was angry at Heathcliff, but even angrier at Edgar who wanted to throw him out: "after constant indulgence of one's weak nature and the other's bad one, I earn for thanks two samples of blind ingratitude, stupid to absurdity. Edgar, I was defending you and yours, and I wish Heathcliff may flog you sick for daring to think an evil thought of me".
After that she locked herself in her room, fasted for three days, and came out not at all well, kind of delusional.
Nelly found Isabella's springer almost choked, hanged, poor thing, but she saved it. In the morning they discovered that Isabella had eloped with Heathcliff. Edgar was grieved, and considered her no more his sister. Six weeks later he received a letter, to inform him that they were married. A fortnight later Nelly received one too, where she learned her situation. Isabella was now living at Wuthering Heights, living with wild Hareton, fanatic Joseph, mad Hindley and cruel Heathcliff: she had learned to fear him and hate him. When Nelly went to see her, Heathcliff said: "the very morrow of our wedding she was weeping to go home" (no other comments, but I wonder about their wedding night: in the afternoon she loved him, in the morning she feared him and hated him..), and "she abandoned (her house) under a delusion, picturing in me a hero of romance (..) so obstinately has she persisted in forming a fabulous notion of my character (..) the passion was wholly on one side and I never told her a lie about it. She cannot accuse me of showing one bit of deceitful softness. The first thing she saw me do, on coming out of the Grange, was to hang up her little dog (..) no brutality disgusted her (..) if only her precious person was secure from injury". He never loved her and had no problem in saying so. He only loved Cathy, who never recovered. Catherine Earnshow died giving birth to her daughter Catherine Linton. The night after her funeral, Isabelle escaped and went near London, and after a few months (maybe six) she gave birth to Linton. After a few months since Cathy's death, Hindley died, drunk. Hindley had mortgaged everything he had for cash, all gone in drinking and gambling. Heathcliff supplied the cash, so now he was the owner of Wuthering Heights and everything. He kept Hareton as a servant. Little Cathy grew up a recluse, but happily indulged. Edgar didn't want to risk an encounter with Heathcliff. After 13 years, when Isabelle was dying she called her brother to take her son and take care of him, but Heathcliff wanted him so Linton had to go living at Wuthering Heights. Disobedient Miss Cathy wandered to the Heights and was shocked and offended when a servant told her that vulgar Hareton was her cousin. Three years after she first saw Linton at her house for like a couple of hours, she wandered again to the Heights, and found Heathcliff quite cordial because he wanted the two to fall in love. Edgar tried explaining to her what Heathcliff really was, but the miss kept writing to Linton anyway, and soon those letters became love-letters. When she found out, Ellen tried to put a stop to it, but the little miss was quite stupid. Linton was unbearable, spoiled, annoying, false, but she called him "my sweet darling cousin" and "pretty Linton" :-/ idiot. She said "I've learned to endure his selfishness and spite with nearly as little resentment as his sufferings" :-/
When Ellen told Edgar, he stopped her from going there again, if he wanted Linton could come to her, but Heathcliff didn't agree, so they agreed to meet in the open. Linton was weak and sick but his father didn't care at all, he only wanted him to marry Cathy, so forced him to meet her outside. Cathy was rather disappointed to see him so silent, sometimes sleepy, but he was terrified of her leaving too soon, afraid that his father might see, and he succeeded in luring her in the house, afraid for himself but not thinking about her at all. Heathcliff locked Cathy and Ellen in the house, and forced Cathy to marry Linton while Nelly was locked up for four days and five nights. Right after the marriage, Linton started acting in a despicable way, not caring for her at all, saying things like a wife should obey and she has nothing because now it all belongs to him. Cathy managed to escape just in time to see her father alive, so she was able to say goodbye before he died. Heathcliff came to take her back, though, leaving Ellen at TG. Nobody at WH cared about Linton's health, only Cathy, so no doctor was ever called. After he died, she was left by herself and treated with contempt. Hareton liked her, clearly always had, but she kept treating him badly, with disgust, the double idiot.
Mr Lockwood knew everything there was to know now; having decided to go away he went to WH to say goodbye, although TG was still his for several months to come because Heathcliff was not willing to change the agreement. Cathy was very haughty, scorning poor Hareton for his ignorance, the little brat, she should have helped him instead!
They shared a cheerless dinner then parted. 1802 Mr Lockwood came back after a few months, and found things to be quite different. Nelly was now living at Wuthering Heights again, and Hareton and Cathy appeared to be in love, playing and kissing while she was teaching him to read properly. Nelly told him the rest of the story, what happened in those months of his absence: Cathy became sorry of how she had treated Hareton, probably because she had nobody else there and he might have proved a good ally, so she made peace with him and they became friends, and she started teaching him. Heathcliff strangely was not particularly angry, he acted very strangely. In those days he was not feeling like himself, he felt like he had no reason to go on, no Catherine to love and no enemy to defeat. He stopped eating and sleeping for four days, always smiling (!!) and absorbed in his own thoughts. One morning they found him outside, on the ground, dead with his eyes opened and a smile on his face.
Finally. With him gone everything changed, of course. Cathy was to marry Hareton and go back to Thrushcross Grange with Nelly.
There was a rumour that Heathcliff and Catherine's ghosts were sometimes seen about the moor, and that's it. The end.
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